Page 680 - Arabian Gulf Intellegence

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SLAVE TRADE.

Tiie first obligation imposed upon the Arab Chieftains in the Persian
Gulf, with reference to the Traffic in Slaves, was the provision forming
Article IX. of the General Treaty of 1820.* The words are “ The
carrying off of slaves, men, women, and children, from the Coasts of
Africa or elsewhere, and the transporting them in vessels, is plunder and
piracy, and the friendly Arabs shall do nothing of this nature.”
This Article has ever been understood and held as forbidding only
the carrying off of men, women, and children as slaves, and the transport­
ing them in vessels, when so carried off, although the words may be
said to bear the same comprehensive sense of forbidding the carry­
ing off of slaves, and the transporting of slaves, however procured,
in vessels; but even this most extended acceptation cannot be con-
strued into forbidding the purchase of slaves, and the transport of
them overland, unless indeed the last clause, which provides that the
friendly Arabs shall do nothing of this nature, embraces everything.
The Arabic sentence bears precisely the same meaning, and is liable
to the same opposite constructions.
It would be manifestly unjust to enforce this Article, imposing the
same punishment on dealing in slaves as on piracy, whilst at the same
time the Imaum of Muskat, the Turks, the Persians, and all the Arabs
not included in this Treaty, are allowed to carry on the trade. The
effect, moreover, would be only to benefit the latter, by throwing the
trade into their hands.
The following observations upon this subject, made by Captain
McLeod, Resident in the Gulf in 1823, hold good to the present day:
“ But in whatever sense the words of the Treaty may be understood
by either party, I am convinced that our utmost endeavours to abolish
the Slave Trade amongst the parties to the Treaty will be ineffectual as
long as the other powers of the Gulf persist in it. We may, perhaps,
put a stop to the carrying off of slaves, but their purchase and transpor
* Vide pages 78 to 80 of this Selection.

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